Friday, March 9, 2012

Wow! One Year of Paint Party Friday, already?!? We can hardly believe it! Many of you have been partying with us since week one, and every week since we have met new painters... For all of you, both new friends and old, we are so very grateful! We continued to be amazed, surprised, delighted, and inspired by this ever-growing, fun community of artists. THANK YOU!

As we enter our 2nd year of PPF, we want to focus even more on the painters that party with us each week. (We'll share more about that next week.) Paint Party Friday is such a great community because of all of the fun and diverse painters that party with us each week, which is why we consider today a celebration of YOU! In honor of your enthusiasm, talents, hard work, and dedication to weekly painting, we are thrilled to announce our very first...

This week, when you enter your Paint Party Friday link you will be entered to win...

A one of a kind, black canvas, Paint Party Friday brush holder! But, a brush holder without brushes is just a holder, so we're including...

25 fun and colorful brushes in a variety of shapes and sizes to suit all sorts of painting needs! But wait, there's more - What fun are brushes without paint?!? Not much, so we're also including...

A $25 Dick Blick E-Gift Card, so that you can buy yourself some paint (or whatever else you might need) to go with your new brushes in their fancy-schmancy new holder! Wheee!!!

To enter this giveaway all you need to do is link your PPF post to this week's Mister Linky by Sunday night (11pm EST). All PPF posts linked by the deadline will be eligible for our very first giveaway! The winner will be chosen from all of the eligible entries by a random number generator and announced next week. (If EVA's or Kristin's number comes up, another number will be chosen.) Good Luck!

*Update (3/11/12, 11pm EST): The Giveaway is closed. We reached a record number of participants (104)! Thank you partyers!!! Please check back next week to see who won.*

We are also thrilled that, according to last week's poll, most of you (who have a "track") are either on track or ahead of schedule. Yay! One of the changes for next year (more news next week) is that there will be few, if any, polls in Year 2 - so we thought we'd end this year by asking how (and if) the polls were helpful to you...

Please make sure to use your post URL address NOT your blog home page URL address as there are many late visitors who get confused as to which post is for PPF when they arrive (after Friday) at your website. If you are unfamiliar with Mr. Linky, an explanation of how this tool works can be found on Week 1 and Week 2 Check-Ins.

Thank you all again for helping to make Paint Party Friday so much fun... Now let's get this party started!

Happy birthday and congrats on passing the one year mark... being part of this has meant a huge amount to me and I thank you both so much for putting it together and helping me to find and be part of this amazing and supportive community... who needs a giveaway when you get that as a pressie every week... mind you I'm not saying I wouldn't love those brushes... new brushes that haven't been abused would be soooo luxurious!!!

Love blog parties and PPF is one of my absolute favorites! So many wonderfully encouraging and gifted artists! I can say PPF has given me a lot of inspiration not only by the comments I receive but most especially by what I learn from really generous artists! :^) patsy

Oh I am so happy I found you before you had your first PPF.I entered and copied the PPF symbol and pasted it right away on my blog. I knew I wanted to be here to enjoy everyone's work and to learn, learn, learn. Thank you Eva and Kristin for the hospitality and I sure do look forward to the weeks to come. I have had a lot of fun.Fun, fun, and more fun!!! Yay!!

Congratulations on a year of fabulous art! What fun that you're hosting a give-away. How cool it would be to win that awesome loaded brush holder! Thanks for inspiring me to keep on track with my painting.

Congratulations on your 1st anniversary - PPF has been such a great way to connect with other artists all over the world and I'm so very grateful to you both for continuing to host it every week! And what a great give-away!

Congrats on the first anniversary of PPF!Happy Birthday PPF. I have met many great artistic people here. It is wonderful! I am commiting myself to doing one FULL YEAR from here on! What can you say about that? ... SMILE ON MY FACE!Thank you for being here to help me movtivate myself. hugs, Darlene

Hi Eva and Kristin. Thank you so much for hosting our party every week and thank you for the opportunity to win your giveaway!!!!I so enjoy visiting so many artists to see their work in all its wonderful diversity.Here's to year 2!!!!

Cannot join in this week.........and darn it there is such a fab prize.......boo hoo.Thank you for being such great hosts and opening up the chance for us to see other artists work and meeting such lovely people. Annette x

Congrats to PPF for its first Birthday!!! :) Thanks Kristin and Eva for hosting this event every Friday. It's been fun and hope we'll continue for a long time. :) And you went all out with the giveaway. Thanks for the chance to win it. :)

Happy PPF Birthday! I've only been part of the party for a few weeks, but I'm looking forward to Friday all week, it's such a wonderful and inspiring place! Thank you Kristin and Eva for hosting this amazing event!

When I found Paint Party Friday a while ago I was excited and nervous to join in and I couldn't have imagined what a great community this is- I am a better painter/artist because of these people. They inspire me, the encourage me, and they keep me painting! Thank you for bringing Paint Party Friday to life! The giveaway this week is beyond awesome- way beyond awesome! Congrats on the first year!

Hello Kristen and Eva, happy to be back here on a Friday! Happy Anniversary to Paint Party Friday and to you for hosting for a year! I've just been coming along these last 3 weeks and love it, so cheers to the both of you!

Hooray for 52 weeks of PPF!! Congratulations, everyone! And thank you so much Kristin and Eva!! It's been so much fun and it's helped keep me motivated to keep painting! I so appreciate everyone's kindness and encouragement! It's meant so much to me!!

I'll be late visiting people this week because I'm going out of town, but before I left I wanted to stop by to join the party (so glad I did... what a fabulous giveaway you're offering!).

Happy PPF everyone!! Here's to the next year of painting celebrations!

Happy Birthday PPF! This has been such a great motivator to me to keep painting. And I've met such wonderful artist friends here. All thanks to you both, Eva and Kristin. :)

I will try to keep the word verification off as long as I can. Last time I kept getting so much spam and then a few nasty ones popped up! I finally had to turn the word verification back on. We'll see how it goes this time.

I am so glad to have discovered PPF! This is week 3 for me, so I am very surprised to find that you have only been doing this one year. Everyone has been so nice and welcoming. This is a great inspiration for me to keep painting. Blessings,Tricia

Happy Anniversary, Happy Anniversary, Happy Anniversary....thinking of the Flintstone's song...lolSincerely , A Very Happy Anniversary girls, so thirlled to be apart of this beautiful group. Thanks a bunch Eva and Kristin :)

p.s. What a wonderful gift to celebrate the occasion.....keeping my fingers crossed.

how wonderful! thank you so much for the chance to win these great offerings!! i have so enjoyed the commraderie here even though i haven't played for the entire year...thank you for all you do and i look forward to playing every week in the coming year! it is a great goal i look forward to each week now...and i thought the polls were really fun!

Happy One Year Eva and Kristin! Thank you, thank you for this fabulous blog hop! I enjoy it so much each week! The artist are warm and wonderful and the supportive community of hoppers, well they just rock! Hugs, Robin

I was a late joiner on this one. I have enjoyed everyone, the support and friendship is fantastic. I have learned so much more about tools and products and have attended local art demonstrations/classes. Thank you so much for accepting me into the group and for keeping it going. You are always linked on my site. . . and I have the button. Blessings, Janet PPF

How exciting!! The Friday I actually have art to link up....and it just happens to be your anniversary!! I'm so happy to be able to celebrate this milestone with you...and wanted to thank you for the time and dedication it takes to spread the art love with this blog!!

I'm so lucky to be a part of this supportive, inspiring community of talented, creative souls!! :D

linking up and so excited that you are giving away gifts for YOUR anniversary!!!! This group of artists have really been such an encouragement to me in my creative journey. (thank you so much for putting this together )

Missed last week's party and it just felt so wrong! I've been going through a creative slump and I've been working on getting myself back on my feet! PPF is definitely a great way to start!! Happy week and I love the idea of a giveaway!! Woo hoo!

ooooh happy one year you guys!!!! It has been a fun year at that too hasn´t it!!! Here is to the next year filled with happy paint party parties and fun!!! Giveaways are a goooood idea. I am having one on my blog RIGHT NOW....go over and enter!!!

I'm not participating this week but I thought I'd share something I discovered by accident, with the new two word verification process you only need to type in the first word to get your comment to show. I've done this at least 15 times this week and it only failed once.